Nucleosynthesis Constraints on Scalar-Tensor Theories of Gravity

Abstract

We study the cosmological evolution of massless single-field scalar-tensor theories of gravitation from the time before the onset of $e^{+}{e}^{-}$ annihilation and nucleosynthesis up to the present. The cosmological evolution together with the observational bounds on the abundances of the lightest elements (those mostly produced in the early universe) place constraints on the coefficients of the Taylor series expansion of $a(\varphi )$, which specifies the coupling of the scalar field to matter and is the only free function in the theory. In the case when $a(\varphi )$ has a minimum (i.e., when the theory evolves towards general relativity) these constraints translate into a stronger limit on the Post-Newtonian parameters $\gamma$ and $\beta$ than any other observational test. Moreover, our bounds imply that, even at the epoch of annihilation and nucleosynthesis, the evolution of the universe must be very close to that predicted by general relativity if we do not want to over- or underproduce ${}^4$He. Thus the amount of scalar field contribution to gravity is very small even at such an early epoch.

15 pages, 2 figures, ReVTeX 3.1, submitted to Phys. Rev. D15

Cited by in corpus (38)

• The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment
• The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment
• Varying constants, Gravitation and Cosmology
• The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment
• Primordial Nucleosynthesis: from precision cosmology to fundamental physics
• Probes and Tests of Strong-Field Gravity with Observations in the Electromagnetic Spectrum
• Quintessence, super-quintessence and observable quantities in Brans-Dicke and non-minimally coupled theories
• Violation of the equivalence principle from light scalar dark matter
• Linking Tests of Gravity On All Scales: from the Strong-Field Regime to Cosmology
• Bounds on the possible evolution of the Gravitational Constant from Cosmological Type-Ia Supernovae
• Big bang nucleosynthesis constraints on scalar-tensor theories of gravity
• Inhomogeneous Gravity
• Parameterized Post-Einsteinian Gravitational Waveforms in Various Modified Theories of Gravity
• Big Bang nucleosynthesis and tensor-scalar gravity
• Observational signatures of Jordan-Brans-Dicke theories of gravity
• Constraints on the Variation of G from Primordial Nucleosynthesis
• Decaying Gravity
• Non-Linear gravitational growth of large scale structures inside and outside standard Cosmology
• Scalar-Tensor Cosmologies and their Late Time Evolution
• A comparison of structure formation in minimally and non-minimally coupled quintessence models
• Thermodynamical Structure of AdS Black Holes in Massive Gravity with Stringy Gauge-Gravity Corrections
• The radiation-matter transition in Jordan-Brans-Dicke theory
• Testing The Friedmann Equation: The Expansion of the Universe During Big-Bang Nucleosynthesis
• Phase-plane analysis of Friedmann-Robertson-Walker cosmologies in Brans-Dicke gravity
• Non-universal scalar-tensor theories and big bang nucleosynthesis
• Convergence of Scalar-Tensor theories toward General Relativity and Primordial Nucleosynthesis
• The minimally extended Varying Speed of Light (meVSL)
• Cosmological constraints on the gravitational constant
• Quantum Corrections to the Cosmological Evolution of Conformally Coupled Fields
• Effect of transitions in the Planck mass during inflation on primordial power spectra
• On the Detection of a Scalar Stochastic Background of Gravitational Waves
• Big Bang Nucleosynthesis Constraints on Universal Extra Dimensions and Varying Fundamental Constants
• Dynamical evolution of boson stars in Brans-Dicke theory
• Existence of naked singularities in Brans-Dicke theory of gravitation. An analytical and numerical study
• The dynamics of scalar-tensor cosmology from RS two-brane model
• Sufficient conditions for curvature invariants to avoid divergencies in Hyperextended Scalar Tensor theory for Bianchi models
• Non-minimal scalar-tensor theories
• The Scalar-Tensor Inflationary Cosmology